Grandfather Iroh and the Otherworldly Child
by Artemis Goldborough
Summary: A teenager named Taylor makes a really stupid wish, "I wish Iroh were my grandfather!" "Wish granted." Be careful what you wish for. Lu Ten was never married. Getting thrown into the life, the identity, of Lu Ten's Earth Kingdom spirit seeing bastard, Tenchi, born in the months after the Seige of Ba Sing Se ended, it's not a easy life. It is a wild adventure though. Not a SI. AU.
1. The Ill Made Wish That Changed A World

Disclaimer: Any characters you recognize I don't own. This is just a fun writing exercise.

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Chapter One: The Ill Made Wish That Changed A World

Taylor Bennett loved Avatar: The Last Airbender maybe a just little too much. Taylor's grandfather on the other hand did not. "Turn that racket down!" his grandfather yelled.

"Stupid old man," Taylor muttered, " I don't need him here. I don't need a babysitter. He really didn't. He was fourteen years old, plenty old enough to be left by himself. But no, Taylor's dad just had to invite his dad over while him, and Taylor's mom were spending the evening out. Taylor was just ready for this night to end. He sat there hunched up on the couch in the living room, his feet tucked under him. Up on the TV was Uncle Iroh complaining to the Earth Kingdom soldiers that his chains were too loose. Now this was a cool old man. Even when he was defenseless and at the mercy of others, he was cool. Much cooler than Taylor's grandfather.

"Feet off that couch!" Taylor's grandfather shouted as he barged in the room. "I won't have shoes on the furniture!"

"It's not even your house," Taylor muttered, "You're acting more like a fussy old lady than-  
"I heard that!" His grandfather was standing in front of the coffee table blocking the view of the TV screen. "What is this?" the old man asked gesturing at all the anime DVD box sets that Taylor had stacked haphazardly on the coffee table. It was a big stack Taylor had pulled out half an hour ago, when he couldn't make up his mind what to watch.

"Clean this up!" the old man yelled.

"No!" Taylor yelled jumping up, "You're not in charge of me. You're not the boss! All you've done since Mom and Dad left is give me orders. Do this! Do that! No! You're worse than a drill sergeant!"

Taylor moved around his grandfather to point at the TV screen. "Why can't you be more chill. Why can't you be more like him?" He pointed directly at Uncle Iroh on the screen. "I wish Iroh were my grandfather!"

Suddenly his grandfather went still like a statue, like someone had hit a pause button. The whole room turned black and white like an old photograph. Even the image of Iroh on the TV had turned grey.

"Grandpa?" Taylor said nervously. He waved a hand in front of the old man's face. No response. "Okay, this is weird. Really weird." He tried to pick a glass off the coffee table, but his hand went right through it.

"You really mean that wish kid?" a voice asked out of thin air. The voice was male, youthful sounding, and very playful.

"W-who's there?" Taylor asked. He looked around but all he could see was the living room and his grandfather. He stared at the stack DVDs with a Tenchi Muyo box on top.

"Never mind," said the voice, "It does not matter if the wish was meant or not. Wish granted. Now I'm giving a gift. Pick a name, any name.  
"No, tell me who you are!" Taylor demanded.

"Just pick a name, the voice said.

"Then you'll tell me who you are?" Taylor was scared, but he wasn't going to show it anymore than he had to.

Again the voice said, "Pick a name."

Giving in, Taylor said, Tenchi." It was the first name that popped up in his head.

"Of heaven and earth, eh?" The voice sounded amused. "It only somewhat fits. For a child of the Earth kingdom touched by spirits it is a very fine name. But you will also be a child of the Fire nation as well."

"What do you mean by that?" Taylor asked.

The voice cackled. "You made the wish kid. You should be able to figure this out. You are going to be Lu Ten's son, his love child with an Earth kingdom peasant, conceived before the end of the siege. You being in that world is going to create such lovely butterflies."

"Butterflies?" Taylor was feeling lost here. Lost and scared half out of his mind.

The voice grew annoyed. "And you call yourself a geek. The butterfly effect. Change one thing and everything starts changing."

This whole thing was starting to sound like a really weird, really bad fanfic. He had to be dreaming. This was just too crazy. Taylor needed to do something, but what? The only weapon he had was words. Could he poke a hole in the voice logic. Would that stop this?

"Okay Mr. Mystery voice," Taylor said, "Let's say I believe you. Explain how Iroh is even going to know I'm his grandkid?"

"That is actually a good point," the voice said, "We could tell Iroh about you, but that will not help him find you. More so that will not tell him that you really are his. So we will give you a token. Or rather Lu Ten will give his lover a token that will later be given to you." There was more cackling. "I see what you are trying to. Trying to stall are you? You are not getting out of this, Tenchi. You and the new timeline your presence creates for your favorite story, are going to be the best entertainment I have had in eons!"

"My name's not Tenchi! It's Taylor."

"No, it's not."

Suddenly everything was back in full color. Not everything. Somehow Taylor was black and white. And see through?

"Don't you dare take that tone with me young man!" his grandfather shouted.

Taylor looked. There was his grandfather and _himself?_

The other full color Taylor was yelling right back at his grandfather. "You are not the boss of me!"

Everything faded away, and Taylor found himself standing in an impossible white cloud like space.

"That is was not you," the mystery voice said, "You are Tenchi."

"I just gave you that name!"

"True," the voice said, "You named yourself."

"Okay," Taylor said, trying to out logic the voice, "If I named myself that, what was my name before?"

"You had no name," the voice said, "Or rather you did. You had Taylor Bennett's name. But you are not him, not anymore. His life goes on. But now so does yours."

Taylor found himself shivering. His hands, skin and clothes all still looked black and white. He was also see through, like he was some sort of spirit or ghost.

A baby, a newborn, appeared a few feet away. This," the voice said, "is you, or rather what you will look like shortly."

Taylor could feel himself drifting helplessly against his will towards the baby. He was not in control of this situation, not at all. If the spirit was telling the truth, he was going to wind up a baby in another universe any second. This was really really insane! He'd read fics where self insert characters had been born aware. He didn't want that. And he didn't want to not remember who he was either. He didn't want any of this! There had to be something here he could say or do.  
"Wait a minute!" Taylor said, "Babies are really boring! You don't me remembering everything from the womb or my birth. No way. I don't want that!" He stopped drifting just inches away from the baby.

The baby disappeared. A very small child appeared standing in it's place. It was an Asian looking toddler who looked about two years old.

"Is this better?" the voice asked, "When you remember who you were makes no great difference to me."

Taylor dropped down to one knee to better look at the boy in front of him. The kid had yellow eyes and short black hair that stood up all over the place. The kid was dressed in brown and beige clothing, definitely oriental in style, and kind of shabby looking, a size or two too small.

"Just touch him already!" the voice shouted impatiently.

Taylor reached a hand to the boy. The next thing he knew, he wasn't down on one knee. He was standing. He looked at his hands, now very small. They were the boy's hands. He was wearing the kid's clothes too. "I'm _him_?" Taylor said in disbelief. His voice came out higher pitched and younger, startling him.

"Yes. Yes," said the voice sounding bored. "You're Tenchi. You're three years old now. From your prospective this is good bye. You won't hearing from me for a while, if ever. I'm merely the one to grant your wish. Now go be Iroh's bastard grandchild."

"I'm not a bastard!" Taylor shouted, "And I didn't mean this! I didn't want this!"

The clouds at Taylor feet rose up surrounding him so that he couldn't see anything else. When the clouds faded, Taylor was standing on the street of a village that looked like it belonged in ancient China. The air was chilly. The clothing his new body was wearing was too thin. His feet were bare. He could feel the cold dirt road beneath his toes. He was shivering now from both fright and the cold. But as he looked around, everything began to look familiar as if he'd seen this street, these shops and houses, hundreds of times before.

"Tenchi! Tenchi!" a woman yelled. He knew that voice. It was his aunt Min. But he didn't have an aunt named Min. No. Taylor didn't. But Tenchi did. He was remembering things now, a year, maybe a year and a half of memories, the memories of a small child. It was these memories that told him that somehow he really was Tenchi now every bit as much as he was Taylor.

Tenchi ran back toward his aunt's house. He didn't want to make her mad. She was much scarier than Taylor's grandfather had been. Her threats weren't empty bluster. They were real. As he ran, he started wondering why was he running to her. He had several bruises on his body that had come from her hands. He was moving with a slight limp. His right leg was a little shorter than his left from an badly healed broken leg months ago. She was at fault there too. The part of his mind that had been the little kid had never known anything different than living with Aunt Min. She had raised him after his mom died in childbirth. But the Taylor memories were fitting together now with the Tenchi ones, giving him new insight and understanding. He had been abused. Why should he go anywhere near her?

"Tenchi!" his aunt bellowed. Tenchi was pretty sure half the village heard her. He saw her come his way, and the strangest feeling came over him. It was as if he'd never seen her before, and at the same time had seen her a thousand or more times before. She was somehow both familiar and a stranger. Aunt Min, in her simple home sewn but expensively dyed dark green dress. Aunt Min with her elaborately piled up dark brown hair which made her look even taller. She was so tall, that there wasn't another woman in the village taller than her. His Tenchi memories told him that he had always envied her height. Where she was so tall, he was so small, the smallest boy his age in the village.

Min grabbed Tenchi's arm and dragged him away, yanking him so hard, it hurt. "You're coming home right now. You've spent enough time playing out here with other boys."

He hadn't been playing with them, Tenchi remembered. Right before the mystery voice merged Taylor with Tenchi, the little boy had been off by himself. None of the other boys wanted to play with him. Their parents wouldn't let them. It was his eyes. Like Rudolph's red nose, Tenchi's eyes marked him as something different. Also, he was smart, too smart for his years. Even before now, before the memory merge, Tenchi had been that way. Something was different here. As Taylor he had never thought as fast as he was now.

"No way," Tenchi muttered. "I'm like Bean from Ender's Shadow, kind of." Expect that Bean had been a genetically super human. Which Tenchi wasn't.  
"What are you mumbling about child," Min asked, "You want beans for supper?" She dragged him onward. Dragged was the right word too. His small legs could not keep with her speed.

"Please Aunt Min stop!" he cried out, "You're hurting me!"

She paused for a moment and very roughly swept him up into her arms. A minute later she carried him into her house. It was a small place, made even smaller for being crammed with all kinds of broken junk. That most of the junk had once been expensive didn't make it any less junk. Tenchi saw all like one with new eyes. Before it all seemed liked great treasure. Not now though. There were only two rooms here, so much smaller than the house Taylor had lived in. This entire house was not much bigger than Taylor's living room.

Tenchi's aunt set him down, and quickly set him to snapping beans for supper. On the floor beside a low table he sat there with the string beans, thinking When Min wasn't watching, when she was focused on starting a fire in the big cast cook pot, Tenchi fingered the necklace, the leather cord around his neck which he usually kept hidden under his shirt. Tenchi's aunt had given it to him for his birthday a few months ago. On the cord was a gold ring that had belonged to his mother, and before that his father. The ring had an stylized Chinese dragon on it. On the inside there was an engraved Chinese character, the meaning of which he still didn't know. It was a shock to realize that he was pretty much illiterate. But he still remembered how to write in English. He knew two languages now, he realized.

"Put that away," Min scolded, "Before I take it away. If I thought I could sell that ring I would. But that's more trouble than it's worth. The whole village suspects you're a fire nation's soldier's bastard. You don't want to give them reason to know that you are."

Tenchi was realizing a whole bunch of things. His aunt Min wasn't all bad. She wasn't all either good though. Mostly, she was very broken. The daughter of a rich merchant who had lost everything but her sister and all this scattered junk in the war. The sister who was his mother, now dead for three years. His aunt couldn't move past his mother's death. He saw now that she blamed him for her sister's death. He didn't think she meant to hate him or blame him, but she did some. Tenchi had no future here. He had to get away from his aunt and the village. He just didn't know how yet. He was so darn small.


	2. A Very Affectionate And Friendly Light

Disclaimer: I do not own this world setting. Only the OCs belong to me. This is just a fun writing exercise.

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Chapter Two: A Very Affectionate And Friendly Light

When the sun rose over the village, Tenchi woke up. His bed was a mat on the floor in the main room of his aunt's house. There was loud snoring coming from the back room. Tenchi tip toed over there, pulling back the curtain that acted as a door. He looked in on his sleeping, snoring aunt. She slept in a real wooden framed bed with a straw mattress, that took up way too much of the room's small floor space. A sleeping beauty she wasn't. Tenchi knew better than to wake her, that was a quick way to another beating.

There was no going back to sleep for him. With the sun up, Tenchi never could sleep unless he was really sick. He never knew why before now. It was the Fire Nation blood in him. Iroh was his grandfather. Just thinking that sounded so weird. Taylor had always loved Avatar The Last Airbender, ever since the first time he saw it when he was six years old. He hadn't really gone nuts over it until last year though. It was weird to think of Iroh as his grandfather, but it was downright freaky to realize that he was now somehow an even littler kid than the first time he saw Avatar The Last Airbender. He was in that universe now. He was a part of it. This was both exciting, wonderful, yet creepy and sad too.

He literally wasn't himself, the self he had been yesterday. No, he couldn't think this way. He couldn't be having an existential crisis (a psychology term that he only knew because his mother, Taylor's mom, had been a psychologist.) He couldn't afford any kind of identity crisis. That way led to madness and self harm, and maybe even death. He didn't want to wind up like the suicidal cases he knew his mom, Dr. Martha Bennett, had had to deal with; his mom never would talk about that to him, but Taylor had overheard her and his dad a few times.

He stared at his hands, child's hands. These were his. He wasn't the Taylor he'd been yesterday. He wasn't the Tenchi he'd been either. He was both. If his body was him, he was Tenchi now. He had to accept this and move on to other things. But his heart hurt thinking about where he'd come from.

As Taylor Bennett, his parents had been Dr. Carroll Bennett and Dr. Martha Summers Bennett, highly respected medical professionals, a pediatric surgeon and a child psychologist. He would never see them again; and they would never mourn him. They would never even know he was gone, for in a sense he wasn't.

As Tenchi, his parents were people he never knew, people he couldn't know, for both were deceased. His mother was an Earth kingdom peasant named Mei-Lien. His father was a Fire Nation officer, and he now knew, Prince Lu Ten, the former second in line for the Fire Nation throne.

Tenchi laid back on his mat. Tears fell from his eyes as he curled up in as a tight a ball as he could. He didn't know who he was mourning, the parents he would never see again, or the parents he would never know.

It was a while before Tenchi could stop crying. His body was racked with near silent tears. Sobbing loudly only got him whipped. Any noise would get him hit, if it woke Min up too soon or made her mad. Child abuse had just been a term, an abstract concept from his parents the Bennetts' work. It was shocking, sickening to know that he was now a victim. But he was. And he had to leave. He had thought about leaving last night, and he thought about it even more now. As Tenchi dried his tears, he schemed.

He rolled up his mat. He carefully and quietly open the bottom drawer of an old beat up dresser. It was hard to open. His small arms were not very strong. But there was a bag in there he wanted. He held it his treasured bag and looked through it. With the newly merged mindset that had come upon him late yesterday afternoon, he no longer valued the things in it. Like everything in the room, it was mostly junk, all of it made of unpainted wood or bamboo: little toy soldiers poorly hand carved, a yoyo, a rattle drum, and reed pipes. The last one, the pipes, were the only thing he found that he still wanted. Everything else seemed so simple, so childish and boring. He suddenly missed the video games and DVDs that he'd had in the other world. Even the old action figures long since put away in the Bennett's attic were ten times better than this stuff. He hadn't wanted his Transformers toys in years, but he found himself longing for them. But those had been Taylor's toys, not Tenchi's. They were no longer his.

"I am Tenchi," he whispered softly. He held on to the reed pipes, but put everything else away. He was just closing the dresser, when he heard creaking floor boards behind him. Tenchi spun around real fast.

His aunt was up. Her long brown hair was a wild mess, going everywhere, reminding him of a scene in Frozen where Anna had the worst bed hair ever. If anything, his aunt's was even worse. Tenchi would have laughed, but the glare on her face stopped him. She looked down at the pipes in his hands. "What are you up to this early? Planning to prank me child?"

"No, Aunt Min! No!" Tenchi stood ram rod straight, hiding the pipes behind his back. Staring up at his aunt, at her frightening expression, he never felt as small and helpless in his life, not as Taylor anyway. He couldn't stop her. Anything she wanted to do to him, she could. He was at her mercy. And all his Tenchi memories told him she was very seldom very merciful.

Min's hand came down on him in a stinging slap. Tenchi could feel her hand on his face even seconds later when it was gone from there. He didn't know what to do. Just that he had to do something. He had to get her talking about something, the past maybe. When her mind was focused on dreams of times long gone, sometimes she wasn't so mad. But this could backfire too, could escalate things too.

Tenchi fingered the pipes he was trying to hide, and stopped hiding them. He held them up to his Aunt. He put on his most sweet innocent facial expression possible, trying his hardest to look earnest and angelic. "I wasn't trying to wake you, Aunt Min. Honest. I was thinking of my mother."

Min put a hand on her hip. "And just what do those reed pipes have to do with that?"

"She was a talented musician," Tenchi said, "Wasn't she? I just wanted to practice out in the woods nearby. I just wanted my mom around. When I play, I feel closer to her. I feel like my mother is with me." Tenchi wasn't lying exactly. He remembered feeling that way several times. But he was mostly saying this to manipulate Aunt Min. Sometimes this sort of thing worked. Sometimes it failed epically. Before he hadn't fully understood that this was a manipulation tactic. To the Tenchi who existed before yesterday, it was just a protective instinct.

Tenchi gave his aunt his best smile. "I want to start playing everyday. I want to be as good with music someday, as my mom was."

His aunt snorted. "Hmph! You will never be as good as Mei-Lien." Min's face softened a little. "My sister truly was a beautiful lotus flower. She was a pearl beyond compare. Talents like hers are one in a million."

Min shook her head. "Go ahead and practice if you want. Take some fruit for breakfast and get out of here, Tenchi. I don't want to see you again till noon."

Tenchi bowed respectfully to his aunt, the courtly manners she had taught him ages ago (actually just months ago), which now felt very strange and new. He then made a grab for two apples on the low table in the center of the room. He ran out the door of his aunt's house.

The village was once prosperous enough that it still had walls around it. It was not however a very large village and never had been. It was a quick run to the gates now opening for trade for the day. He waved at the guards and kept running for the woods.

The high school Taylor had gone to was bigger than this entire village. But the school he'd gone to had the attendance of all the high school students in the county it was in. His sense of scale, he realized, may be off. Taylor's world was one of cars and planes and trains. It was a world of easy quick transportation, and in most of America, wide open spaces, a world where a mile was nothing to cross. This world was not at all like that. Well, there might be trains of a sort here, if the ones at Ba Sing Se counted. And there were machines, just not any near this village. The Avatar world in this era was what Taylor's school books might have called an early industrial era. It was sort of like he was in the 1850's now, instead of 2017, and a very rural backwater area at that.

It was dawning on him, that unless he had a sky bison or a Fire Nation steam ship, Tenchi was not going to be moving fast through this world. There was so much he hadn't figured out yet. He turned around to look at the village. He climbed up in a tree and stared at it. He couldn't leave those walls for good until he had a plan of where he was going next. Not unless he had no any other choice. He hated the idea of staying with his aunt any longer than he had to. As Taylor he was used to loving parents and a modern twenty first century American life style. He would never have those things again.

Still it stung to know how bad he had it as Tenchi compared to his old life as Taylor. Because of what he once he had, he knew could never settle for what he had now. A rebellious attitude was rising up in him. There was things now he was considering, that as Tenchi he had never even dared to dream of before, things that he couldn't accomplish yet. But even the American Revolution hadn't gotten started or won in one day.

Tenchi leaned back against the tree. He raised the pipes to his lips and played. The music was fast and not very good, but it reflected all the anger and injustice and sorrow he was feeling. He poured all his heart and energy into his music. It calmed him. It quieted the violence of his feelings. This let him think better without the furry or the sadness tainting his thoughts. He was up that tree for hours playing and thinking. He dreaded going back home, but he did. Until he could get enough gear and supplies and maybe a wagon to stowaway on, he couldn't leave.

Tenchi came back again, and again to the woods at the edge of the village as often as his aunt would let him. Almost everyday for a week he came, going deeper into the woods each time. Then one evening he was still out there, and had been out all day. He was up in a tree playing a slow sad melody. The sun was slowly setting, with the extra strength it gave him gradually fading. It was then that Tenchi saw something strange.

Something pink was floating on the wind. No, it was flying. It was a little ball of pink light. It was about the size of a golf ball. It came right up to Tenchi. He paused in his music playing and almost fell out of the tree. The light made a noise like little bells being rung.

Tenchi tilted his head back and forth looking at the little pink light. "What are you? A Tinker Bell wanabe?" This light made him think very much of Tinker Bell, from the stage versions of Peter Pan, which the Bennetts' had made their son sit through more than once during trips to New York and London.

The light made that bell noise again, a different pitch, a different melody. Tenchi's sharp mind and ears had been getting very used to subtle changes in musical notes over this past week. It was the strangest thing, but Tenchi felt like the ball of light was squawking at him, like it was yelling at him.

"You don't like being called Tinker Bell?" Tenchi asked teasingly.

There was more of that squawking bell sound.

"How about Hikari?" Tenchi suggested, but this didn't please the pink light either.

"Sakura?" No.

"Ichigo?" Again no.

The light circle around Tenchi's head. It landed on his reed pipes, then flew up. It landed again and again.

"You want me to play some more?" Tenchi asked.

The bell noise this time sounded somehow like a yes to him. Tenchi couldn't understand how he knew what this thing meant, but he did. It wasn't words exactly. It was feelings. The light was communicating to him in emotions. It had to be some kind of spirit. Tenchi should have been wanting to run away. In the Avatar world, in Aang's time, spirits were always shown to lead to trouble. In the Legend of Korra, they were usually even worse. He was incapable of explaining it, but Tenchi felt perfectly safe with this light. It was kind of cute too. He suddenly remembered a scene in Galaxy Quest where really cute creatures turned out to be really dangerous. He didn't think this was the case here. He didn't want to believe it.

Tenchi stared up at the sky, at the stars appearing. "My aunt is going to ready to kill me."

The pink light made a questioning sound, laced with the feeling of worry. The bell peals became frantic.

"Calm down!" Tenchi shouted, "Geez, relax! She's not literally going to kill me. She's not going to be happy with me. That's all." He climbed down from the tree and ran for the village walls. The pink ball of light followed him.  
"Stop please," Tenchi said pleadingly, "You're really cute. You're beautiful even. Your bell voice is very pretty."

The pink light rang out a pleased little five second melody.

But-" Tenchi raised a hand. "You can't come with me. My aunt really would be mad then. I should be back here tomorrow morning though. If not, then the day after."

The light continued to follow him.

Tenchi waved his hands frantically at it. "Go back! Go back! I like you. But my aunt won't! She won't let me keep a dog or even a fire ferret!"

It still followed him.

"No! No!" Tenchi yelled "Stay in the woods! Please!"

This didn't work either.

Tenchi made it to the walls, just as the guards were closing the gates. The light was right beside him. He just couldn't get it to know that no meant no.

"One second later Tenchi," one of the guardsmen said, "and we'd have shut the gates on you."

Tenchi looked at the guard and then the light. The guard wasn't reacting to it. Neither of them were. The guards couldn't see it! So why could he? His grandfather, Iroh had been able to see spirits. He knew that from the show. But that was only because Iroh had been to the spirit world. As far as Tenchi knew, he hadn't been there himself, unless the way he had been brought here to this world counted. There was so much that he didn't understand about his arrival or rebirth here, no matter how much he thought about it.

The pink light followed Tenchi home. He stood in front of the door of his aunt's house, feeling like he had just gotten the attention of an unwanted stray pet that had decided to follow him home. It wasn't that he didn't like the strange little spirit. He did. It was that he just knew that somehow it was going to add a new complication to his life. In both series, Aang's and Korra's, the spirits always seemed to cause trouble every time they showed up.

The little ball of light rubbed against Tenchi's head in loving sort of way like a cat rubbing up against its owner. It was hard not to like it. It's touch was like feathers rubbing against him. Tenchi laughed as it's touch tickled him. "You're so affectionate and warm. I ought to call you Nuan."

The little pink light flared so brightly for a few seconds, turning an incredible scarlet red. It was so brilliant, so bright, that Tenchi had to blink and cover his eyes. There was an excited and happy trilling from it too.

Tenchi groaned as he uncovered his eyes. His voice, however, was good humored as he spoke, "You like that name, do you? You really are like a stray that followed me home."  
The pink light turned a hot pink. It's bell peals shouted out, broadcasting their meaning to his heart: Yes! Yes! Yes!

Like he had thought before, more complications, more trouble. But this felt like the first good thing that happened for him since he got here. Nuan was a spirit, not an animal, not a pet. Perhaps though, she could be a friend, his first friend ever in this lifetime.


	3. How The Child Finally Left His Village

Disclaimer: I do not own this world setting. Only the OCs belong to me. This is just a fun writing exercise.

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Chapter Three: How The Child Finally Left His Village

Tenchi walked into his aunt's house with dread. The pink ball of light, the spirit he had just named Nuan, soared ahead of him. Her bell like voice was so happy so cheerful. He pulled the door shut, dragging his feet a bit, only wishing that he could be that joyful, but fully expecting more pain and more abuse from his aunt. What he didn't expect was for his aunt to suddenly sweep him up in a crushing hug and spin him around. Lately, (as in ever since the memories sets merged) he really hated being picked up. It reminded him too much of how small he was. And being hugged so tightly by Aunt Min was just awkward and odd, uncomfortable too. He reacted very stiffly against the embrace. Nuan fluttered around the room making a musical noise that somehow made him think of laughter.

"C-can't breathe," Tenchi struggled to say, and Min loosened her grip.

"You stupid boy," Min said as she put him down, "Do you have any idea how worried I was? You were supposed to be home hours ago. Anything could have happened. Wild beasts could have eaten you. Spirits could have taken you."

Tenchi's gaze followed the little spirit that was now loose in Min's house. Nuan was flying all over investigating every little thing in the room.

"What are you looking at child?" Min asked.  
"Nothing Aunt Min." Tenchi shrugged and looked up at his aunt, really looking at her for the first time this evening. Her hair looked even more elegantly pinned than normal. She was wearing her best dress, multiple shades of green, traces of yellow, and lots of embroidery. She only wore that when she was off to the mayor's manor, the only two story house in the village. The mayor paid Min to tutor his daughters three or four days a week in a number of different things including manners, tea ceremonies, and calligraphy. It was all boring stuff that Tenchi had never paid much attention to, but it was also the main thing that kept food in his aunt's cupboards.

Tenchi watched Nuan's exploration of the room. There was so much old junk, and the spirit was so small that it was taking her a while to examine everything.

"It's not nothing that you're looking at," Aunt Min said, "Something has your attention child." Min looked around too. "What is it you're seeing?" Like the guards earlier, Min didn't seem to be able to see Nuan.

"It's nothing. Just a lighting bug," Tenchi lied.

Min turned around the room searching then shook her head. "You're not fooling me boy. You're not a good liar."

Min was unusually calm. Instead of being hit, Tenchi was sent to bed, without super. He was sent to Min's bed. It meant that later that night, he wouldn't able to sneak to the pantry or out of the house without the risk of disturbing her.

Nuan flew out of the house, straight through Min's bedroom wall. She was definitely a spirit. Not that Tenchi had doubted that before, but this was the clearest, most definitive proof he had. He stared at the wall, longing to follow her. He forced himself to try to sleep. He knew what coming later. Min was not a restful sleeper. Kicks and elbow jabs were a normal thing when he was forced to sleep in the same bed as her. This was the only abuse from Min that he was pretty sure she wasn't aware that she did.

When Tenchi awoke at sunrise, as he always did, he was being hugged by Aunt Min again, this time like he was a kid's favorite teddy bear. There was no sneaking away. Worse still it was raining outside. Min never let him out and about on his own on rainy days. Worst case scenario: he'd wind up stuck with Min all day. The best case scenario was not much better, that he could end staying most of the day with one of two reluctant village women who had babysat him before and didn't like him much more than Min. Was there anyone in this village who liked him? Tenchi didn't think so. He'd never even noticed it all that much before he got the other set of memories. It was just the way things had always been, as natural as breathing, then suddenly it wasn't. There was suddenly this whole other life, this whole other understanding of a better life in his head. It was a life he could remember not appreciating when it was his.

The worst case scenario for the day happened. Tenchi was stuck in bed with Min for hours, then forced to dress in stiff, too small, formal clothes. Afterwards, he was carried off by Min to Mayor's house, where they were ushered in by the mayor's servants.

Stepping into the halls of the mayor's place did not impress Tenchi much. As Tenchi he couldn't remember the first time he had been here, and as Taylor, he'd seen better. He'd visited palaces and castles in Scotland, England, and France. He been on a tour of the White House once too. Taylor's parents had been major history buffs with a great love of traveling. They hadn't been to any Asian countries though, and that was the only thing that made place this interesting. It was the showier side of East Asian style architecture, and unlike the cartoon, very very real.

The servant led Min and Tenchi through the hall to a room where three little girls waited, all taller and older than Tenchi. Two of them sat around a table with actual chairs. All three looked bored. Tenchi knew them all by name but wished he didn't. Their names didn't match who they were at all.

The oldest girl was a ten year old who was about as pretty in the face as a horse. Yet she was named Meifeng, which meant either beautiful wisdom or beautiful wind. Tenchi couldn't remember which. He always got that mixed up, mostly because he couldn't stand her.

The next daughter at age eight was named Ting. Graceful she wasn't. Chubby and clumsy though? No question.

The youngest Rou was the only one Tenchi even sort of liked. At four, she was just one year than him. If her parents wanted a meek mild gentle kid, that wasn't what they got. Rou was doing a handstand when Min and Tenchi walked in the room. "Hi there Tree Boy!" Rou said, smiling with her head upside down. "From this angle you look even funnier than normal!"

"Rou!" Min yelled, "Young ladies do stand on their hands!"

At the table Meifeng snickered. Ting giggled and stuffed a pastry in her mouth.

"Young ladies do not eat their food so swiftly either!" Aunt Min corrected Ting. "A lady is gentle, demure, and never ever in a rush if she can help it!"

Tenchi suppressed the urge to groan. He'd never met anyone in either of his lifetimes that could out snob Aunt Min when she really got going. As Taylor he'd met a few that could equal her though. He'd hated those types too. The worst of high society acted that way, as did some who weren't even anywhere near rich.

Most of Min's attention was soon focused on the older two girls. She sat at one of end the table with them. Parchment and quills were laid out. Calligraphy was the focus of the day.

Tenchi and Rou were at the other end of the table with chalk slates and pieces of chalk. Silly sketches were all they were doing, and not very well.

Tenchi's motor skills were horrible. But his body was very young too. In his past life as Taylor, he'd had a cousin, a guy who'd had a long history of motor skill problems well into elementary school. The only way to deal with poorly developed hand muscles and fine motor skills, was to exercise one's hands a lot. It was bugging Tenchi now that his hands were so weak. He remembered being a good artist in his previous life, but he certainly wasn't now.

"What's that supposed to be?" Rou whispered loud, looking at Tenchi's chalk drawing.

"Wolf," Tenchi muttered, though the drawing only vaguely resembled a dog.

"You mean wolfbat?" Rou said.

"No, wolf."

"No such thing!" Rou's voice was just a little too high in volume, earning the two of them a glare and a shush from Min.

After about an hour, Min left the room for a few minutes. Tenchi wished she wouldn't. This was what he always dreaded about being here.

Meifeng was no beauty, true. But she was clever with her words, in a sharp mean sort of way. "Hey brat," she called from across the table. "What's with you and those trees everyday? Do you think you're some kind of monkey? Do you think you belong in those trees?"

"The whole vilage is talking about your tree climbing ob-obsess-" Ting struggled with a word.

"Obsession, Ting," Meifeng stated, annoyed.

Ting nodded. "That's the word. It's weird. You were in those trees all day this past week. What's it like outside the village walls? What's up there in those trees? Berries? Nuts?"

Meifeng scoffed. "Honestly, must you be so food crazed Ting? If I were an unwanted orphaned bastard, food would be not my main desire. I'd -"

"I'm not a bastard!" Tenchi yelled.

"It's just the facts, brat. Your parents weren't married. For all that your mother was a distant cousin to both of my parents, in the end she was as fallen as a woman can get, just a camp follower, a cheap tart who met some random fire nation soldier."

"Take that back!" Tenchi shouted. "My mother was the beautiful woman ever. My father was a prince!"

Meifeng laughed. "Prince of what? He sure wasn't a Earth Kingdom prince, not with those dragon eyes you've got!"

"Meifeng," Ting warned, "Don't you think you're going a little too far?"

Meifeng threw her shoulders back and laughed. "I'm not going far enough. I'm only saying what all the grown ups say. Tenchi here is just another worthless fire nation bastard. A half breed of no good-."

Tenchi lunged, jumping on the table, and climbing across it. In his crawling charge, he kicked slate boards to the floor and knocked over ink bottles.

"My dress!" Ting shrieked. Ink dripped down her formal clothes, ruining them.

Tenchi stood up on the table before Meifeng ready to tackle her to the floor. Meifeng screamed. Trying to doge Tenchi, she sent her chair reeling over backwards. Somehow, they both wound up on the floor in tangled heap, his fists hitting her. This didn't last too long. A male servant came rushing in, grabbing Tenchi. In record timing Tenchi was thrown out of the manor's front doors.

Tenchi sat there on the ground in front of the manor, blinking, with a light drizzle rain falling on his head, wondering why he did that. Why did he attack her? Her words were nothing new. Every other week, sometimes more often, he heard that awful stuff from her. He'd heard similar things from other village kids too.

His aunt Min was going to come looking for him soon. Tenchi didn't want to deal with her. She never listened to him about anything. When older boys beat him up, Min blamed Tenchi for it. This time he was sort of at fault too. At least it looked that way. As far as he could tell without a mirror, he didn't have a mark on him. But Meifeng was going to be black and blue for days. He was ninety percent positive that he had given her a black eye.

Tenchi ran from the manor as fast his feet would allow without tripping. With one leg slightly shorter than the other, that was not a very rapid speed. He felt as slow as a snail.

Tenchi ran through the village to the gates, then to the trees. He tried to climb, but the wet bark was harder than normal to climb, and he gave up.

Reed pipes in hand, Tenchi sat under a tree and played.

The pink ball of light Nuan showed up, flittering above his head.

Tenchi smiled at the sight of her. "Where did you go off to? I could have used a friend last night and today."

Nuan's bell voice was questioning.

"I'll be your friend if you'll be mine," Tenchi said.

Nuan was still questioning.

"What is a friend? Is that what you're asking?" Tenchi had to stop and think for a second before explaining. He'd never really thought of this much in either in lifetime. He'd always had friends as Taylor and never had them as Tenchi. There'd never been a real need to define the meaning of the word before.

"A friend," Tenchi said, "is someone who spends time with you regularly if they can. Who is kind to you. Who defends you if they can, when someone tries to harm you. A friend is someone who helps you if they can. If they can't help, then they try to lead you to someone who can help you. A friend is someone who listens, who accepts you as are, but challenges you to be better if you do wrong or get lazy. Who wants you to be the best you that you can be."

Nuan's bell voice trilled **Yes! Yes! Yes!**

"You want to be my friend?" Tenchi asked.

Again: **Yes! Yes! Yes!**

Nuan's words weren't exactly words in the human sense. It was strictly bell and other music note sounds. Tenchi couldn't understand how he knew what she meant. He didn't really care though, as Nuan's voice trilled **Yes! Yes! Yes!** over and over joyfully.

Tenchi laughed. "That's enough! You're like a cross between Tinker Bell and a Bit. You've got about as many words the Bit from the eighties Tron movie too. Nobody really wants to hear one word over and over like that. Wish you could really speak."

Nuan questioned him again in her wordless way: **?**

"I don't know what you want. You want to me to talk about the story Tron?"

 **No! No! No!**

Tenchi scratched his head. "You want to hear about me?"

 **Yes!**

Tenchi shrugged. "I'm nothing special. A little dumb. A little too impulsive, maybe. Sometimes drag my heels too much, hesitating when I shouldn't. I really wish I knew when to speak and act, and when not to. Always seem to have this bad timing problem, in both lifetimes."

 **?**

"I'm not from this world. Not completely…" Tenchi began to tell Nuan about his current life, also about his memories from his time as Taylor and the stupid wish that landed him here. It all spilled out, words and feelings that he hadn't shared with anyone. "… and you want to know the worst part? My grandfather there wasn't so bad. He was no Uncle Iroh, but no one is. Uncle Iroh isn't supposed to be real! None of this is!"

Tenchi burst into tears. Nuan rubbed against his cheek. She felt soft, like the fur of a rabbit pressed against his face. He petted her and thought even more of rabbit fur.

"I keep meaning to leave here, the village. I really do, but the furthest I get is these trees. I don't know when to leave or how. I don't even know where I am in the timeline of the ATA exactly. I just feel so small and helpless. So confused. As Taylor I was so spoiled and never really knew it. As Tenchi I've been so abused, and I never even fully realized it until recently. I've never been really independent in either life, and I don't know how! I feel so alone!"

Nuan rubbed against Tenchi lovingly, and he found himself relaxing some. He wasn't alone. Not right now. For all his planning and daydreaming over the past week, he didn't have a clue what he was really going to do. But at least for now he wasn't alone. He had a friend of sorts. He had Nuan.

Tenchi may have had Nuan. But he also had to eat and sleep at some point. There were no nuts or berries in the forest, like Ting had suggested, not that he knew of.  
It was near sunset before Tenchi returned home, again. When he stepped in the hut, Nuan was with him, just like the night before.

This time though, Min was sitting on the floor at their little table, with her hair disheveled. Her clothes weren't much better, though she was still wearing the fancy ceremonial style clothes.

And Tenchi realized that he'd never changed out of his finery either. He knew he'd picked up grass and mud stains. The somewhat rainy day hadn't helped him there.

There was a clay sake bottle on the table. Min was slumped over the table, sipping a cup of something, most likely the sake. Not a good thing here. Drunk Min was Mean Min.

Tenchi was tempted to run. But Nuan flew away from him, investigating the room. Like a large glowing pink firefly, she fluttered all over the place. Tenchi tried to chase after her. Tried being the word. Nuan was just too fast. The spirit moved so effortlessly and swift that Tenchi was in awe of the way she moved. Yet he was also worried about Aunt Min, about she might react, about what she might do.

Nuan continued her hunt around the room, soaring this way and that. Her bell voice rang out her pleasure and her questions, until she finally settled in one place, landing on a shelf filled with trinkets and oddities. She started moving one of Min's old and nearly empty perfume bottles rattling it against another bottle, blue glass clanking against green. The cap went flying off the blue perfume bottle. Nuan landed on top of the blue rim covering like she was a replacement for the cap she had just thrown. Her bell like voice was very loud and very pleased. Tenchi could feel how Nuan was from the sounds she made.

Aunt Min didn't look too happy though. She sat up straight looking thoroughly spooked. Her eyes went from droopy to wide enough to almost pop out. Her brows rose astoundingly high. "What was that? What did that?!"

Nuan's light seemed to contract, shrinking, growing smaller, and she dove right into the bottle. Her pink light lit up the blue bottle, making a section of it a beautiful glowing purple. The pleased bell noises sounded out louder and louder. Then the bottle began shaking. Min looked pretty shaken too, trembling even. Her face was nearly as pale as white rice.

"Stop that!" Tenchi said, approaching the bottle. "Get out of there."

"Who or what are you talking to?" his aunt asked.

Tenchi scratched at the back of his neck. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you."

Min's words came out in a nervous yet forceful breath: "Try me." She rose up to tower over Tenchi. He had seldom felt more aware of how short he was.

Min glared.

Tenchi trembled. "You know what you always say about spirits…those silly old stories you tell sometimes to scare me…how they can take a person off who knows where?"  
Min put a hand on her hip impatiently.

Tenchi bit his lip. "Um, well-"

He had the feeling he was going to get hit no matter what he did. He'd seldom seen Min look this angry. The narrowing of her eyes, the downward arching of her brows making an almost perfect v. He was doomed to a beating if he spoke, and equally doomed if he didn't. Well, if the outcome was the same, it didn't matter what he did…

Tenchi rolled his shoulders back and stared up into his aunt's eyes, pretending to a confidence he didn't truly feel. He met her gaze firmly. "A spirit didn't take me off, Aunt Min. It followed me home."

Tenchi pointed over at the shelf. "She's a little ball of pink light brighter than a firefly, and- and- I think she's swimming in your perfume bottle right now. Apparently you have very good taste."

Tenchi knew he shouldn't have said that. He really shouldn't have. He gazed down at the floor. He was expecting to be punched or shaken, and hoping to only be slapped. He closed his eyes, bracing himself for the inevitable.

Instead, Min laughed. It was a harsh and mocking sound. "Only you would tell such a ridiculous story and expect me to believe it. You must think I'm stupid or something boy." Her hands grabbed at Tenchi's shoulders. As he had feared, he found himself being shaken like a sapling in a windstorm. Her grip was so strong, it made his shoulders hurt. He felt like he might pass out. Without meaning to, Tenchi screamed.

Nuan floated out of the perfume bottle, passing right through it. She grew and contracted, and grew and contracted again until she was nearly the size of a basketball. Her pink coloring darkened to purple. Hot pink lines of light streaked across the purple like lightning. Her voice now was not like bells but instead the shattering and breaking of glass. If Tenchi could have covered his ears he would have. The noise was horrible.

Min let go of him. She raised her hands halfway to her ears and turned her head this way and that. A bewildered grimace was on her face. "What in the world is that racket?"  
Nuan was huge, frightening, and hovering above Min.

Min moved as if to hit Tenchi, but she was the one who was knocked down. Tenchi barely moved out of the way as she fell. She hit hard against the door. Tenchi wanted to run away now, but her body was blocking the way out. His aunt was still, too still. He crept toward her. She was blinking. She was breathing. Her eyes were glassy though. Concussion? Maybe?

The dark purple Nuan charged at Min.

"No!" Tenchi yelled, "Don't hurt her! You're not supposed to be dark! Please stop!" Nuan didn't seem like Nuan. She scared him worse than Min now. All the images from book two of Korra, of dark spirits, flooded his mind. Recalling those scenes wasn't much fun anymore, not when he knew or suspected that in another reality, another timeline very similar and close to this one, that they were real. He backed away, kept backing away. His back hit a corner of the room. He ducked down and curled up as tight as he could, his arms wrapped against his knees. He closed his eyes. The tears leaked through his eye lids. He rocked himself back and forth. He didn't know how he stayed like that. He heard his aunt's foot steps at one point, but he ignored her.

Tenchi just wanted this world gone. He wanted to be Taylor again. Mostly, he just wanted to stop thinking entirely. His mind was too sharp now. Everything here was too real. It was too scary. And he hadn't even managed to leave this stupid village yet. It wasn't the danger that scared him, not that so much. It was the lack of a safety net. No parents. No family. No one that cared much for him.

A pink light glowed in front of Tenchi's eye lids. He hesitantly peeped up. There was Nuan, still as big as a basketball, but her former pink color again. She was almost too bright to look at. He blinked three times and stared warily.

Nuan changed. She shrunk a bit. Her glow faded and a form began to appear. Tenchi blinked again, this time in disbelief. Hovering in front of him now was not the ball of light of the past two days. In its place was a bunny rabbit, a slightly glowing pink bunny rabbit, with a thick streak of red running from its chin down its chest and stomach. There was a highly stylized looking line of white on either side of its red underbelly. There was a white circle around the pink fur surrounding one of its eyes, its royal blue eyes. The inside of its ears were red circled by white too. There was a flap of something white. Feathers. Attached to the bunny's back were a set of angel like white wings which were moving either super speed fast or very slow. Tenchi wasn't sure which. He was reminded of a Animal Planet program that had shown a humming bird hovering with its wings moving so fast that they looked still.

Tenchi stared and stared. The bunny stared back. It was a regular Mexican standoff, only without the guns. And Tenchi was pretty sure he wasn't a threat to this thing…

The bunny flew up to Tenchi's head and nuzzled it's head against him comforting him. Tenchi reached cautiously to pet it. Its fur, her fur, was smooth and sleek. A bell trill came from the bunny. "Nuan?" Tenchi asked.

"Nuan sorry," the bunny said in a little girl's voice. "Nuan love Tenchi."

Tenchi felt his jaw drop. He had trouble finding words. "Y-you speak?"

The bunny nodded. "Nuan protect Tenchi!" She was trying to sound either fierce or brave, but her voice was too young sounding and too cute for that.

Tenchi laughed nervously. "If I known yesterday that you'd look like this, I'd have called you Usagi or Chibiusa. Your coloring sort of makes me want to think of Sailor Mini Moon."

"Nuan is Nuan!" the bunny said angrily, as if she were a little kid pouting, "Nuan like her name!"

Tenchi laughed more freely. Nuan the bunny was so cute. It was hard to be frightened of her. He knew she could be scary, but she wasn't right now. Even when she'd been scary, it had been to protect him.

When Tenchi got up from the floor, Nuan flew to his arms. He held her and petted her. She was so soft, so comforting to hold.

Min was back at the table with the sake. She didn't seem very aware of her surroundings. She didn't even have a cup. The cup was on the floor empty. Min drank the sake straight from the bottle.

"You were never normal boy," she said, but she could have speaking to the wall. Her focus was not on her nephew. "Always too bright. Always too smart. Even the day you were born, there was something strange about you. You stopped breathing for well over a minute. Neither the midwife nor I understood why you started breathing again. You were pronounced dead. Then without warning, you started gasping for air and screaming."

Aunt Min's head turned to look at Tenchi. There was contempt in her narrowed eyes. "I never wanted you. I promised my little sister though that I would look after her son. I tried. I did. I couldn't do it though. I cannot raise the way that I should. I see you and I see him, the fire nation bastard, the soldier who abandoned my sister, who broke her heart. He was a handsome thing, an officer, a noble. Like a hero from an old storybook. Who wouldn't fall for such a man? I was half enamored of him myself. But he chose my sister. He started the killing of her, and you finished the deed on the night you were born."

Min took another swig of the sake. The anger was replaced with sorrow. "You see an old woman. But I am not. I'm not even thirty yet. Looking after you is trying to raise a monster. You were touched by the evil of spirits from the night of your birth. I want you and that thing in your arms gone from my house!"

Tenchi sucked in a deep breath, a gasp. "You see her?"  
Min cackled, a bitter joyless laugh. "I'm not blind. That thing wasn't visible before but at this point I suspect anyone could see it. Now, get out of my house." She rose to her feet stumbling and grabbed a broom as if it were a weapon. She towered over Tenchi, appearing ready to murder him.

With Nuan still in his arms, Tenchi fled from the house and never looked back.

Tenchi hobbled through the village, running as fast as his shorter right leg would allow. As always, it was not too fast. The quicker he moved, the more prone to tripping he was. Running, even this much, always meant a risk of falling.

Tenchi ducked into a barn that was used as a warehouse for the village, and sometimes, rarely, a stable. Nuan flew from his arms, exploring as she seemed to like to do. Tenchi spotted a cart that was full of cabbages. He recalled the cabbage merchant from the cartoon, but decided that that would be too much of a coincidence. He needed a place to hide and rest, one where he wouldn't be discovered easily. He had thought many times about stowing away on a wagon. This could work instead. He unloaded a good deal of the cabbages into a stall, and covered them with straw. He carefully climbed in the cart. He fit, but not very comfortably. Cabbages did not make for very soft bedding. Nuan landed beside him. Tenchi stroked her fur, then pulled cabbages over both of them. He fell asleep petting Nuan.

"Cabbages! Oh cabbages! How lovely are my fair cabbages!" a man's voice half shouted half sung.

Tenchi woke to the bouncing of the cart, and that awful singing. He peered up through the pile of cabbages. He couldn't see the face of the man moving the cart. But his clothes looked like those of the cabbage merchant. But those clothes were also the kind worn by like half the Earth Kingdom. It couldn't be the cabbage merchant. It just couldn't.

It could.

Nuan flew upwards sending several cabbages rolling. The man pulling the cart stopped and gawked at her her. "You- you rodent! You've been eating my cabbages!"  
It was the cabbage merchant alright. Tenchi was almost sure of this. And why did Nuan have to decide to make herself visible all the time? Tenchi groaned. He then pulled himself up to stand awkwardly on the cabbages in the cart and confront the cabbage merchant…


End file.
